Facebook campaign to ground Puma helicopters for good gets 20k likes

The Facebook group is gathering hundreds of followers each hour (Picture: Facebook/Destroy the Super Pumas)

A Facebook group calling for the discontinuation and grounding of Super Pumas has garnered over 20,000 likes, following a helicopter crash earlier this week which killed four people.

The campaign, which began on the internet yesterday, is calling for the end of Super Pumas, an aircraft that is frequently used to transport workers to and from offshore oil platforms.

On Friday night a Super Puma L2 helicopter carrying 16 oil rig workers and two crew members ditched into the sea off the Shetland Islands after a ‘loss of power’.

The crash has prompted angry responses from union leaders who have deplored the helicopter’s safety record.

RNLI volunteers shine a light on to the ditched helicopter during the rescue mission (Picture: Reuters)

Pat Rafferty, the Scottish secretary of Unite union said: ‘This is the fifth major incident in the last four years involving Super Puma helicopters in the UK offshore industry and the second resulting in fatalities. It’s unacceptable and it can’t go on.’

The Facebook group is also calling for its followers to sign a petition which asks for employers, the Scottish parliament and helicopter operators to acknowledge that the oil rig workforce ‘don’t want to fly’ the Super Puma fleet.

The petition’s blurb says: ‘We request that s92 or alternative route of transport offshore happen before we have another ditching.’

Sarah Darnley, George Allison (top left and right) Gary McCrossan and Duncan Munro (bottom left and right) died in the crash (Picture: PA / Police Scotland)

Rafferty added: ‘A full investigation must now take place and the industry’s helicopter operators must use every means at their disposal to demonstrate that its fleet is fit for purpose.’